Manufacture of sugar.



IINITED STATE PATENT @FFICE.

HENRY ARMANI) JOSEPH MANOURY, OF PARIS, FRANCE.

MANUFACTURE OF SUGAR.

No Drawing.

To all whom "it mag concern:

Be it known that I, HENRY ARMANI) J OSEPH MANoURY, a citizen of theRepublic of France, and a resident of 11 Rue de Surene, Paris, France,have invented certain new and useful Improvements in the Manufacture ofSugar, of which the following is a full, clear, and exact description,such as will enable others skilled in the art to which it appertains tocarry out the same.

In the process of extraction of sugar by diffusion it has been hithertoa common practice to pass a current of water through a succession ofvessels containing the beet cuttings or other raw material, wherebythere is obtained a progressively stronger and stronger solutioncontaining on the one hand crystallizable sugar and on the otherhand-the non-crystallizable sugar and the various impurities whichcompose the molasses. By a variety of well known chem ical processes acertain proportion of sugar has been hitherto extracted from the molasses, after which the remainder could only be made useful byevaporation and incineration of the residue to obtain the salts itcontains. It follows that there has been hitherto obtainable frombeetcuttings, crystallizable sugar, a forage for cattle of relativelylow nutritive power, and a small proportion of potash salts. The expenseof the processes above outlined is considerable, and they involve awaste of valuable nutritive matter in the solids which are incineratedfor extraction of the potash salts.

It. is the object of my present invention to provide a process wherebythe nutritive impurities of the molasses including the noncrystallizablesugar are returned into the beetcuttings during their last stage ofdiffusion treatment. thus avoiding a great part of the expense of theprior processes and obtaining a much more valuable forage than hitherto.For this purpose I take advantage of the peculiarities common to priordiffusion processes.

It has been hitherto common to pass the pure water used for diffusionfirst into a vessel containing those cuttings which are most nearlyexhausted by prior diffusion, and then successively through less andless exhausted cuttings, until lastly the freshly cut beets are reached.By this means the extracting power of the diffusion liquid ismaintained, in spite of the continually in- Speoification of LettersPatent.

Application filed November 4, 1909.

Patented Feb. 21, 1911. Serial No. 526,178.

creasing strength of the solution. The nearly exhausted beets to whichthe enter ing diffusion current is supplied I term the last cuttings,and it is into these that I propose to return or reintegrate thenutritive impurities which have been wasted in the course of earlier andmore expensive processes. For this purpose, instead of supplying purewater to these last cuttings, I substitute at this point what may betermed by-product liquids resulting from subsequent stages of theprocess. These liquids may consist of some or all of the followingclasses: let the dilute emptyings of the various diffusers. 2nd thejuices flowing from the presses wherein the forage is compressed. 3rdthe molasses, or else the liquor remaining after chemical extraction ofsugar from the molasses. In addition to the by-product liquid so used, aproper proportion of pure water may be added if necessary at any desiredstage of diffusion, depending upon a variety of circumstances well knownto those skilled in the art.

Before using the by-product liquids they are stirred, clarified andfiltered, and a suitable proportion of antiseptic substance ispreferably added to prevent alteration of the sugar. In case theby-product liquid contains much lime or similar substance resulting fromchemical treatment of the molasses, it will be necessary to neutralizethis ingredient with carbonic, sulfuric or phosphoric acid. Inasmuch asthe last outtings which have been nearly exhausted by previousdiffusion, contain a much smaller proportion of valuable impurities thanthe by-product liquid which passes through them, this liquid will giveup to these outtings the impurities contained in solution, in accordancewith the laws of osmose, until the proportions are balanced between thecuttings and the liquid. At the same time, since the by-product liquidscontain practically no crystallizable sugar, they will serve to extractsuch sugar from the lastcuttings as efficiently as pure water, and willsimultaneously return to the cuttings a large proportion ofnon-crystallizable sugar together with the other nutritive impurities.It will thus be seen that, by use of my process, I do away with thewaste and expense incident to evaporation of the liquid remaining afterchemical treatment of the mo lasses and at the same time obtain a muchricher and more nutritive food product resulting from compression of theenriched last cuttings.

Vhile my process is herein described as used for extraction of sugarfrom beets, my invention will apply to any diffusion process havingas aby-product a forage for animals.

WVhat I claim is:

1. The process of enriching the forage byproduct obtained fromextraction of sugar by a diffusion process which consists in returningsome or all of the by-product liquids to the vessel containing thenearly exhausted cuttings, substantially as described.

2. The process of enrlclnng the forage byproduct obtained fromextraction of sugar by a diffusion process which consists in re turninginto the current of diffusion liquid beginning with the nearly exhaustedcuttings the liquid remaining after the usual chemical treatment of themolasses for extraction of crystallizable sugar therefrom, substantiallyas described.

In Witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand 1n the presence of twoitnesses.

HENRY ARMAND JOSEPH MANOURY.

